2:11 PM — Culture Secretary Maria Miller has refused to rule out using the Parliament Act in order for the government to get its planned equal marriage legislation for England and Wales on the statute book, in the event of parliamentary deadlock.

26th December 2012

9:26 PM — Already petitioned to label the Westboro Baptist Church, home of the God Hates Fags campaign as a 'hate group', Barack Obama is now being petitioned to give the same label to the Catholic Chutch.

8:48 PM — An ICM poll for the Guardian has found that 62% of all voters support gay couples being given the right to marry. A record 52% of Conservative supporters say they are in favour of David Cameron's proposals.

8:19 PM — The petition for President Obama to class the Westboro Baptist Church, the home of the 'God Hates Fags' campaign as a hate group has been named the most popular ever on the White House's 'We The People' website.

7:17 PM — Naftali Bennett, the chairman of a minor Israeli party, The Jewish Home (Habayit Hayehudi) has said that Israel should stop recognising same-sex marriages and that he joked about a gay solider in his army unit "in good fun".

3:36 PM — A high court judge has come under-fire for arguing that the government should not legislate for same-sex marriage as he claims it only benefits 0.1% of the population. PinkNews can reveal that last month he promised to take a 'lower profile' on the subject after complaints were made about his involvement in the Marriage Foundation.

1:57 PM — Lynne Featherstone, now an International Development Minister, but previously the Minister for Equalities argues that religious leaders need to have more faith in their own beliefs and stop trying to force others to live by their anti-equal rights views.

1:39 PM — The British Board of Film Classification has said it has received complaints about a film depicting Jesus and his disciples as gay men despite the fact that the film has never actually been made.

1:00 PM — A series of polls for PinkNews.co.uk has found that the popularity of the Conservative Party has grown since the general election, with David Cameron now a more popular choice to be prime minister than Ed Miliband. Most LGBT people said that by proposing same-sex marriage, David Cameron has positively altered their opinion towards the Conservative Party. Support for the Liberal Democrats has sunk, reflecting national opinion polls.

7:40 PM — As 2012 draws to a close, PinkNews.co.uk takes a look back at the most important stories of the last twelve months. While we have looked at the top fifteen stories that have changed LGBT life the UK this year, this category is dedicated to the strangest stories of the year: the news in 2012 which took us completely by surprise.

PinkNews covers religion, politics, entertainment, finance, and community news for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community in the UK and worldwide. Founded to produce broadsheet quality journalism for the LGBT community, we cover politics to theology in an intelligent manner.